LBN’s Bob Donley points out a room six feet by ten feet is a small room. Sixty square feet. But it’s a room where some people live twenty-three hours out of every day. Inmates in solitary confinement live in rooms like that, in some cases for as much as twenty years. An inmate in solitary confinement eats, sleeps, uses the bathroom, exercises or reads within that sixty square feet. “Welcome to life in solitary prison.”

Prison wardens also say that some inmates must be separated from the general population—people like child molesters, rapists, and ex-gang members. These are people who must be placed in solitary confinement for their own protection. Donley reports that President Obama has ordered a Department of Justice review of solitary confinement. Of course, the president has power only over the federal prison system. And fifteen governors, mostly Democrats, are looking at ways to reduce the solitary confinement population. There is some suggestion that the Supreme Court may consider whether solitary confinement violates the Constitution.